"Well, Gradjaa the Hutt is dead,"
Kerrie Kiley proudly announced as she took up her regular perch at
The Alderaan Café's bar. She raised her eyebrows at the bartender
who instinctively knew to pour her the cheapest Corellian ale in the
house. She could barely manage to afford the temporary use of a
clean glass.

"Let me pay for that," El-Nay
Darr,
another regular at the bar who knew Kerrie well, chimed in. It was
El-Nay who began Kerrie's bloodlust three months ago when she
brought her the news that the Corellian Defense Force had
accidentally killed her family while they were attempting to smuggle
for the recently deceased Gradjaa the Hutt.

"Thanks, El-Nay," Kerrie replied,
"but I got this."

"You hardly have any creds left,"
El-Nay said as she picked up her drink and moved to the barstool
adjacent to Kerrie.

"I'll manage," Kerrie said as she
took a big swig of her newly arrived ale.

"It's been months Kerrie,"
El-Nay
said quietly, "How much longer can this go on? You've killed the CDF
officers. You've killed everyone in Gradjaa's smuggling operations
and now somehow you've managed to kill Gradjaa herself. There's no
one left to kill!"

"No," Kerrie said slamming her mug
down on the bar. "Claudius Rodney," she explained in a cold
deliberate tone.

"Who the frig is Claudius Rodney?"
El-Nay asked, her frustration growing by the moment.

"The man who ruined my life," Kerrie
told her as she stared into her ale. Each bubble that floated to the
surface seemed to hold a memory for her. "He's why my parents are
dead and why they hated me," she explained.

"How did one man manage all that?"
El-Nay asked.

"Before the Clone Wars my father was
an honorable man. He owned his own shipping company that thrived
with Republic support. When my people chose to support the
Confederacy my father stayed loyal to the Republic," Kerrie said,
retelling the events that would forever be burned into her life.
"How did they repay him?" Kerrie asked rhetorically. "By stripping
of him of his Republic contracts when they judged the Clawdites as a
whole. And it was Claudius Rodney, the Representative of Delaya, who
was behind it. He never knew my father. He had no right ... no right ...
to judge him. He destroyed my family. They had to give me up the
Mabari warrior knights and leave their homeworld. The Clawdites
wanted nothing to do with them either. They had to become smugglers
just to survive. When I finally tracked them down they could never
accept the woman I had become, the woman I had to become because of
what Claudius Rodney did to us. They hated me because of Claudius
Rodney. Now they're dead because of Claudius Rodney. Now it's time
for him to finally meet my father."

El-Nay sat there for a moment in
silence. She had never heard the entire story before. Finally she
blinked and exclaimed, "You're going to kill a member of the
Senate?"

"He's not a member of the Senate
anymore," Kerrie informed El-Nay.

"Well that's a relief," El-Nay began
to say.

"He's an Admiral in the Imperial
Navy," Kerrie pointed out as she finished her ale.

El-Nay sat there motionless with a
blank expression. She was now convinced that Kerrie had gone
completely insane. "Well ... good luck," El-Nay told her, taking a sip
of her own drink. "You're gonna need it," she said under her breath.

Kerrie sat quietly aboard her
transport going over her plan of attack. She had managed to track
Admiral Rodney to the Ottega system. There, he had traveled to the
homeworld of the Ithorians with his longtime friend and doctor,
Pilaq Tohan. The planet was under Imperial blockade and it would not
be easy for her to reach her target, but it was not the first time
she was faced with the obstacle of an Imperial blockade.

For most of his journey Admiral
Rodney would be offered the security of the Conquest, an Imperial
I-class Star Destroyer currently in the system. "Even I can't
infiltrate a Star Destroyer," Kerrie said to herself in a dejected
tone. Finally, she came across a report from Alderaan's foreign
ministry that the Admiral would be returning to the Jubilee,
an Ithorian hardship and the site of one of his early diplomatic
posts. "I've got him," Kerrie said with a wide smile as she shut
down the holonet receiver and headed for the cockpit.

Kerrie preceded the Admiral's
arrival aboard the Jubilee by less than an hour. She roamed
the corridors of the hardship looking for the correct spot to lie in
wait. She decided that she could not take the chance that he would
visit the vessel's large marketplace and set herself to find a way
to get close to him. When she was about to give up she spotted a
Twi'lek Holonet reporter interviewing some of the locals.

Kerrie waited for the reporter to
head to the refresher, following close behind. As the Twi'lek washed
her hands Kerrie approached from behind and based her on the base of
her skull with the butt of her hold-out blaster.

The Twi'lek groaned lightly and
slumped to the ground unconscious. Kerrie quickly stripped the woman
of her clothes and changed into them. In the blink of an eye she
used her prowess in shape shifting to become a female Twi'lek. While
it was not an exact match, it would do. "Aliens all look the
same to humans," she thought to herself.

Admiral Claudius Rodney smiled to
the crowd of Ithorians who came out to greet him as he walked
through the ship's promenade with Doctor Tohan.

"Has it changed much since you were
last here?" a Rodian reporter asked the Admiral.

"Some things have changed," the
Admiral replied, "but it is still a very warm and friendly place. I
heartily recommend visiting one of these amazing and unique vessels
if given the opportunity."

As the Admiral continued from the
crowd he spotted Kerrie masked in Twi'lek form. She was very
attractive and he smiled at her warmly.

This was the moment that Kerrie had
waited for. She returned the Admiral's smile and stepped forward.
From the confines of her sleeve she produced a hold-out blaster and
leveled it at the man's chest. "Say hello to my father," Kerrie said
to him disgustedly as she pulled back on the trigger and sent a
blaster bolt towards his chest.

"Gaah," the Admiral cried in pain as
the blaster bolt impacted his chest. He fell into the crowd of
Ithorians who had surrounded him. They soon hurried him back towards
the airlock from whence he came.

Doctor Tohan reached forward with
his walking stick and smashed Kerrie in the forehead with it. Kerrie
just stood there, unflinching. She did not move from the position
from where she fired and a devilish smile curled upon her lips. She
was too enthralled to even feel the first blow to her head. "He's dead,"
she thought to herself proudly.

Kerrie felt the second blow as the
head of the walking stick cracked her skull. She fell like a sack of
potatoes, blood gushing from her forehead. She had lost
consciousness and reverted back to her true Clawdite form by the
time she impacted the cold, durasteel floor with a dull thud. Her
last conscious thought was one of satisfaction.

"Ugh," Kerrie groaned as she awoke.
For a moment she thought she was in the afterlife, but you do not
have headaches like the one she had when you are dead. Her eyes
slowly shifted into focus, but she had no idea where she was.

Kerrie sat up slowly and swung her
legs over the side of her bunk. She was overwhelmed with a sense of
nausea and immediately vomited on the floor. "Oh," Kerrie murmured
in a long groan.

Suddenly the sound of a man's
laughter filled her head. Kerrie looked around and soon realized she
was within a holding cell. An electronic force field separated her
from freedom. Outside the cell there was a solitary figure standing
in the shadows. "At least he's dead," she thought to herself as she
considered her situation.

Kerrie's worst fears materialized when
the man stepped forward from the shadows. It was Admiral Claudius
Rodney. She had failed at her task and now she was at his
mercy. Her first instinct was to break down and cry, but she would
not let him have the satisfaction.

"Who are you?" the Admiral asked
her, "And why are you trying to kill me?"

"My name is Kerrie Kiley," she said
proudly, "You killed my parents and for that you will die."

"I killed your parents?" the Admiral
questioned her, "As far as I know, you are the first of your
species that I have ever met."

"You ruined my life," Kerrie
screamed at him. She surged forward towards him and collided with
the forcefield. Electricity flowed through her body and she
exclaimed in pain, "Ahh!" After a moment she collapsed to the
ground, unconscious yet again.

It was in that position that she
awoke once again. For a moment she had hoped it had all been a
dream, but it turned out she was living a nightmare.

"Good," Admiral Rodney said as he
noticed her moving, "You're up."

"Why are you alive?" Kerrie asked
herself more than him as she struggled to sit up inside her
detention cell.

"My dear," the Admiral explained
with a cruel smile, "Next time you attempt to kill someone ... don't
do it when he's standing directly next to his doctor. You'll find it
is highly ineffective."

"Arr," Kerrie exclaimed in
frustrated as she struggled back up. She glared at him through the
forcefield. She wanted to reach out and choke the life from him, but
that it seemed would be impossible.

"The Empire believes you to be dead,
Lieutenant," Admiral Rodney explained to her, "I read your
file. You were quite the highly touted ISB prospect."

"That was a long time ago," Kerrie
told him, her glare unflinching. "They left me for dead," she
explained, "So let them think that."

"What did I ever do to your
parents?" the Admiral asked her, genuinely interested.

"It was during the Clone Wars,"
Kerrie began to explain.

"The Clone Wars?" the Admiral said
in disbelief, interrupting her, "The Clone Wars were twenty years
ago. You have waited all this time to kill me?"

"They only died three months ago,"
Kerrie said, not amused by his comments in the least.

"You destroyed my father's life. You
forced him into a life of smuggling to survive. It is your fault it
got him killed," Kerrie screamed at him as the tears began to flow
from her eyes.

"You're blaming me because your
father died during an illegal activity?" the Admiral asked her, not
accepting her logic.

"He was doing what he could to
provide for himself. He had a life. A family. A business that he
loved," Kerrie explained through the tears, "You took it from him.
You took him from me ... twice!"

Even though there was a forcefield
between them Claudius took a nervous step back from her. Whatever
had happened had certainly made a dramatic effect on this woman's
life. "I still don't follow your logic," he meekly said to her.

"My father owned a transport
company. He was loyal to the Republic his entire life. When the
Clawdites left the Republic he stayed, but you ... you ... took his
contracts from him. You gave them to a human company and left us
with nothing," Kerrie hysterically explained to him.

"The Clawdites betrayed the
Republic," Claudius told her, "We could not do business with them."

"My father betrayed no one," Kerrie
screamed at him and surged forward into the forcefield once again. "Ahh,"
Kerrie screamed in pain as the electrical currently surged through
her frail body once again.

"Lower the shield ... lower the
shield," Admiral Rodney screamed to the guard.

"Unh," Kerrie moaned as she
collapsed helplessly into the arms of the Admiral. She looked at him
through hazy eyes with more rage than he had ever seen combined in
the course of his life and then watched her slip into
unconsciousness yet again.

The next time Kerrie awoke she felt
something different. She was not a cold durasteel floor nor was she
in an uncomfortable, undersized cell bunk. She felt comfortable ...
she was in a bed. It took a moment for her eyes to focus, but she
looked around and saw that she was in a cabin on the Star Destroyer.
"What am I doing here?" Kerrie wondered aloud.

"I didn't want you to electrocute
yourself again," Claudius explained to her. He was seated in a chair
several feet from a bed.

"You!" Kerrie cursed as she
struggled out of bed to lunge towards him. She did not quite make it
though and collapsed to the floor in front of him.

"You have an unfortunate habit of
hurting yourself," the Admiral said as he looked down at her, "Don't
struggle. Please. I have let you out of your cage because I believe
you can be useful. If you have no use, then I might as well have you
thrown out an airlock with the rest of the garbage."

"Use?" Kerrie said to him from the
floor, utterly repulsed, "You've got to be crazy if you think I'd
never have sex with you."

"While I thank you for your kind
words," the Admiral said over a soft laughter, "That was not the
kind of use I had in mind. Despite the fact that I am alive ... you
are quite resourceful. You would be a great asset."

"I just tried to kill you and now
you're offering me a job?" Kerrie said, her brow furrowing as she
tried to grasp the strange concept. "Why would you do that?" Kerrie
asked as she sat back up.

"Because I too have a daughter," the
Admiral told her quietly.

Kerrie paused for a moment and
suddenly the tears reappeared. She clung to his pant legs and buried
her face into his knee as she sobbed helplessly. The Admiral placed
a sole hand upon her shoulder.

"I hate you ... so much," Kerrie
struggled to say through the tears.

"I know," the Admiral replied
somberly.

"But that hate is all I have now,"
Kerrie explained, looking at up him, "And I swear I'll keep you
alive so that I don't lose that too."